November 2022 Speaker
Paul Barwick kept us entranced with his tales of International Espionage in the 1930’s before the start of World War Two and during the wartime.
His talk concentrated mainly on Nancy Wake who was born in New Zealand in August 1912 and was named Nancy Grace Augusta Wake. When she was 2 years old her family moved to Australia and when she was 16 she left home to work as a nurse in a Mental Institution. At 19 years old she packed her suitcase and managed to get a cabin on a boat for £200 which transported her across the oceans to New York, then Liverpool and in 1932 she arrived in London aged 20.
She enjoyed a great social life in London whilst working as a croupier in London pubs and clubs and spent many weekends in Paris and became a fluent French speaker. Whilst in France she embarked on a Correspondence Course at The London School of Journalism based in Paris, and continued her European lifestyle and then moved to Vienna in 1936 just as Nazi aggression came into Austria and the Nazi’s persecuted the Austrian Jews.
Nancy vowed that she would fight back and moved to Marseilles where in 1939 she married Henri Fiocca and they had a few months of Grand South of France lifestyle before the Germans invaded Poland and tried to invade Paris in June 1940.
Because of Nancy’s language expertise she became a courier for the Pat O’Leary escape network working for Captain Ian Grant Garrow who was organising escape routes for French people via Gibraltar and then back to Great Britain.
She then joined the Special Operations Executive (SOE) and helped transport people through France, working with Vera Atkins and Violette Szabo who were in France. In August 1944 Nancy cycled from Chateauroux to St Sanvin in mid France to collect new Code Books after theirs had been destroyed by bombing. She returned to Chateauroux 3 days later. A very brave and feisty lady again.
In May 1945, VE day she escaped to Spain and sadly found out that her husband Henri had been executed by the Nazis in 1943.
After the war Nancy joined The Ministry of Defence and the Metropolitan Police Force. During her 34 years with them she spent 12 years in Police Intelligence, the last 5 years in Counter Terrorism.
She married a RAF officer John Forward in 1957 and they retired back to Australia in 1985. After John died in 1997 Nancy sold her medals to the Canberra Memorial Institution and at the age of 89 in 2001 returned to London and became a resident in The Stafford Hotel in St James Place, and they have and American Bar with a Bar stool and a memorial bust made in memory of Nancy
She finally passed away at The Royal Star & Garter Home in Richmond on the 7th August 2011 aged 99. An amazing lady and hopefully well remembered by many.